The Advaita Trap 1: Absolute and Relative Confusion - The Cartoon

[aerycksmusic]

He's not going to get any honey, seeing honey don't exist. :)

[AlexanderIsaacConan]

Haha, at 0:07 when the bear said, "stop right there," I actually happened to pause at that very instant :P

[perceptionsevrything]

the funny thing is both of them (and all awakened One's)

talk to One another as if they are separate, and argue back and fourth

they are both just confirming their illusions

hahaha, it's so true

[kreonsa]

This was uber fun! :D

[Meggo55555]

this is great :)

[MrEngineer103]

All of us are manifestations of the single consciousness bound by karma.

Whatever is bound to happen will happen based on karma.

We are a witness to our actions with no control over the results.

[Taaplari]

@MrEngineer103

We have an illusion of free will, so do you think that we should not use it, because it's an illusion? If we are in the level of experiencing free will, we have also experience of some control. That's why we also experience influences of that control, how ever illusory they may be. That's how we create karma. If I don't let my dog out, it pees on the floor.

[Firenz7777]

@Taaplari It's not that we don't have free will, it's that we have it and we don't have it. This is the problem with thought, it arises after something happens. Thought is never truly in the current moment, it's in the past. When something happens, we have a measure of control over that occurrence, a choice so to speak. After this something happens, it becomes pre-destined to have happened, it happens exactly as it was supposed to happen. This all occurs simultaneously though.

[Taaplari]

@Firenz7777

This is difficult with my English abilities, but there is SO many point of views in dualistic levels which are "correct" from the places they are perceived, but I still don't think there is free will if we look from the "mountain top". My point was that people should not explain their actions saying; "I really don't have free will, so there is nothing wrong in what I did." So, as long as we FEEL that we have possibility to select, we have also responsibility.

[engimalover]

advaita is nothing but indian bullshit

[engimalover]

all these indian gurus are nothing but selfish charlatans

[Akashian123]

Hahahahahahhaa!



[jobedied]

What happened to him is the old all American head stuck up his own ass syndrome. The only way out of it is to take a big crap and clear his brain from his rectal area so he can start to think free of the rectum he was imitating.

[talkinghead22]

I don't really see the point of this. It seems to presume that when non duality is comprehended that you will go around being an arrogant ass. If that happens, then it happens but for me life just went on as usual- it just became obvious that no one is here.

[Firenz7777]

@talkinghead22 haha to me this is the fun part of non-duality. It can arise in any manner of life, no matter how small or big and important something is, there is non-duality in everything ( and nothing ...). Once you come to see this, you can truly enjoy anything, hate anything, love anything, etc. The emotions and feelings are no longer dependent upon a source, they can spontaneously be there outside of the 'real' context of the situation.

[MikeRoePhonicsMusic]

Does that means you can copy this video without permission and sell it since "there is no video?" Right.

[22mar79]

@MikeRoePhonicsMusic Yes, that is right.

[22mar79]

@MikeRoePhonicsMusic A true advaitin would never claim authorship, let alone copyrights. But there's no true advaitin either.

[aikiwoman]

Can you say abuse? Oh right, there is no abuse, there is no abuser. "Your suffering is your problem not mine." Yah that's seriously advanced compassion that is. Funny and also sad because this really does happen.

[nowbellhere]

Funny thing is this guy's voice sounds just like Eckhart Tolle. Was that intentional?? This guy is presenting nonduality like it is living as absolute nothing. How can awareness be a nothing?

[babeCZar]

no, there is nobody here who thinks!

[shdoug]

This is brilliant. Love it. Machine Gun of Truth, LMAO!

[pettyjazz]

lmaooo... "STOP... who sees that, what is there to see, who is there to see" ahahahah

[deanne609]

This is so funny.... Find the humor in the world...There is beauty in humor : )

[briankwilcox]

Every "spirituality" has its own trap(s), Pressed too far, sense becomes non-sense. We humans tend to do this. I am much helped by Advaita. When appllied well, it moves one from body-mind, to Self. That can't be but good. Yet, the two are still present. fully; relative real is still real. Mooji again and again makes this clear. Sad that some persons take something meant to lead us to more compassion and more joy, and turn it into another system of denial and arrogance.

[melvinbrand]

And then just wait till the Advaita bully faces a deep life crisis, then, hideously, after denying everyone any sympathy at all, they then come around venting their own problems and seeking an ear to bend just like everyone else in trouble. So then there's this one-way relationship where the Advaita person gets to ask all his friends and family for sympathy, but then finds philosophical excuses to deny it to others when its his or her turn to be soft and kind. Classic bully features.

[melvinbrand]

In this way, it's almost like talking with a fundamentalist Christian. It's not so much a worry that all of their theories are wrong, but rather the creepy way they take those theories into their personal lives and nauseate everyone with it. The miracle of fundamentalist Advaitas is that like fundamentalist Christians, they actually have a kind of sociopathic inability to see how they come off and how it makes others feel.

[melvinbrand]

The part Advaita keep missing is the coldness and the bullying. No deeply spiritual person disagrees with the ultimate truth of the idea presented. That's not the point here. The point is not to make fun of the ideas, but to show how "asshole-ism," (an emotional state of being), has crept into Advaita and has started to make it irritating, not from the standpoint of it being untrue, but from the standpoint of people being assholes and not having mercy on people.

[mariamrit]

Parrot.



[BayviewFinch]

I think I'm a bit of both people here. I love to notice beauty in nature, want to connect with others, yet have the same logic as the brown dude.

[melvinbrand]

Yes! I had a friend completely become this way, almost down to the letter. I was exactly in the position of the tree-lover, who was not permitted to speak. This is so perfect that whoever posted this got what is going on. It's sad, because I really like Advaita, but it's being ruined by exactly the type of preacher depicted in this film. Someone must do something about the Advaita Shithead Syndrome, which I now dub: ASS.

[roxanneworld11]

@melvinbrand Demonstrates how any kind of belief can become a fundamentalist religion. If we think we're the teacher & others are all the students - in such a pushy way - that's also duality. I find value in the principles. But still, in a way, the 'non-dual' concept kind of cancels itself out right away. Why I prefer to see it as a tool to make use of from the inside out.

[melvinbrand]

@melvinbrand I think we're on the same track with this. I'm a fan of Gangaji, so obviously I'm not anti-Advaita, as I also like Papji and others. But I think Advaita, like all other schools of thought, is useful at the right time and right place. And what is required is sensitivity to know when to use what tool. The cartoon illustrates not that Advaita is wrong, but that folks have lost their sensitivity to themselves and others when using it.

[melvinbrand]

@melvinbrand There is a time and a place to let people talk in conventional language, and even a time and place to let others be a victim or be helpless. Demanding absolute spiritual strength from everyone at all times more or less equals becoming a simple drill sergeant, and drill sergeants don't usually make it as friends of mine. The world is harsh enough, the last thing we need is to have all our friends become asshole life coaches when we need them for love and sympathy too sometimes.

[justcornelius]

@melvinbrand there is a difference between traditional advaita and the modern neo advaita.. you are refering to neo advaita .. traditon advaita is quite different. neo advaita understands the ultimate truth and the methods used to bring about self realisation but it misses something. it misses the point by completely denying the relative. neo advaita is like a bike with no wheels

[melvinbrand]

@justcornelius Yes, that is an important distinction, because even Ramana Maharshi allowed for all levels of practice and even tradition, as well as did Papji. And Gangaji too is very accepting of the relative and ordinary experience. She describes herself in one video as a person with ordinary blisses and ordinary miseries, just an ordinary person. And so her style of Advaita I trust, because it's very human. However, I lost a friend who got into the Neo so much that he drove me away.

[everheart66]

I'd rather say: it's like wheels with no bike ;-)

[TWITfromURANUS]

lol

[Taaplari]

Karen Richards and Tony Parsons? ;-)

[stillmoretocome]

This is absolutely wonderful...quite hilarious. Thank you! Love and Laughter to you.

[marktywharton]

many others have walked away too PMSL brilliant!

[marktywharton]

many others have walked away too PMSL brilliant!

[marjorielard]

continued... When all unconscious guilt is finally burned up in the light of true forgiveness, we are home. Off the wheel.

[marjorielard]

Just because we are temporarily trapped in the false universe doesn't mean we shouldn't show compassion to our seemingly separate selves. There's no need to teach the "other", ie., our projection. The purpose of awakening is to transition to the happy dream. If I am happy it could rub off on you. That's teaching enough. Uncompromising forgiveness will usher in the happy dream.

Complete forgiveness is justified because nothing happened. When all unconscious guilt is finally burned up in the lig

[transitory23]

So basically the bear is speaking from the standpoint of the absolute, within and through the relative, denying the very means by which he is communicating to a spatio-temporally apparent external entity of which he denies, Advaita doesn't relegate the relative to unreality from the standpoint of the relative. Anyway, I probably sound like the brown bear now, hahaha.

[DavidAKZ]

@transitory23 spot on ! The brown bear did come to appreciate the relative truth of the beautiful tree though. Could you say he was transformed by love ?

[transitory23]

Adi Shankara, the one who consolidated the doctrine of Advaita Vedanta, wrote in his Brahmasūtrabhāșya, "There could be no non-existence (of external entities) because external entities are actually percieved. ...

An external entity is invariably perceived in every cognition such as pillar, wall, a pot or a piece of cloth. It can never be that what is actually perceived is non-existent."

Empirically the tree is real, for a time, then it is gone, hence in contrast to the eternal, it is unreal.

[RichardFeynmanRules]

This so completely nails "neo-advaita" BS! Genuine practitioners of advaita - yes, there are such! -- don't talk or think like this. See Shankara or Sri Aurobindo is you want to learn about the real deal.

[TheAfterLifeNow]

is that Tony?

[pitdroidtech]

The tree can be a concept and also be beautiful. Is not a piece of art a 'concept' expressed? Is it the canvas and paint that is beautiful, or is it the concept expressed that is beautiful? The medium; paint canvas or duality, is illusion. The concept though is real.

[DavidAKZ]

@pitdroidtech Is the medium the message ?

[samnyc2]

There is no youtube, so there is no video so this comment does not exist. You are not reading this comment and you are not wearing pants.

[DavidAKZ]

@samnyc2 all part of the dream

[IpsaPaphum]

Non-dualist preaching can hardly avoid being monotonous, predictable, boring and....self-contradictory. Silence or restricting oneself to answers to direct questions might be attractive options.

[chasherbable]

first there is tree then there is no tree then there is. that no tree guy was quite the advaita bully. funny!

[Dennisvanderflier]

Horror like cold neo-advaitism. Empty concepts.

[FreeHealthBooks]

THERE is no comeent at all!

[FreeHealthBooks]

There is nobody writting this comment!

[jobedied]

Thank God my erections still happen now and then although these desires are distracting and fun and getting obsessed with trying to stick them into female friends can be worrisome it gives me a focal point of understanding myself.

[robertbrennanaa]

There's too much of me in that brown bear for this to be funny.....damn

[SimpletonJohn]

but, but, but, there's no advaita trap, and nobody to get caught in a trap! :P

[ShaktiScintilla]

LOL so very true of the advaita mumbo jumbo...

[MYV382N]

Pink bear is very patient :S I would've strangled someone like that ages ago ;)

[padrinolalaobsernene]

haha this is so truee!!

[moknowspromo]

LOL!!!

[cybervigilante]

I've been looking at Advaita videos for two hours, and I'm so sick of them it's making my nose bleed.

[cybervigilante]

She needs to beat him with a stick, to see if it bothers him, since there is no stick and no on beating him with it ;')

[1Earth0Karma8]

@cybervigilante Haha LOL. agreed. The physical Reality is as real as it gets. Everything is Here, the Truth lies within the Physical. Even the point of this advaita philosphy "realization" happens HERE. Everything = HERE. This so called "awakened clarity" happens HERE. There is no other point but the Self as Life is Here and all of existence is Here. This realization = Here. Matter gives rise to consciousness, consciousness is irrelevant its a CON. The trap is to not take self-responsibility.

[megawavez]

lol - my friend did this for two years !

[kingofmilwaukee]

@megawavez

There is no friend. There is no 2 years. Who sees 2 years? Who sees a friend? =)

[nowbellhere]

This clip shows the problem when someone tries to speak from absolute reality. There is no speaking from absolute reality. In the exchange of communication we can only speak within the play of the relative and limited dimension. Words can never represent the absolute. There is no standing and speaking from the absolute.

[pastorlangill]

To dam funny when anything becomes literal it becomes a shadow.

[AExodus7]

Advaita, when expressed, is narcissism, but I think everything when expressed is narcissism. Advaita in of itself is true, but when it is expressed with intention, it becomes just as false as the tree being individually beautiful.

[aramhampson]

advaita for many is motivated by narcissism, they think they are so bitchen and want to feel superior.  everyone should ignore these dorks, act like they dont exist then see how they like it.

[aramhampson]

advaita is Narcissism 

[DavidAKZ]

@aramhampson are you projecting ?

[jroclynx]

the one on the right is Gilbert S. from Australia

[RichardFeynmanRules]

"No, there's nobody here who thinks." Ahahahahahahha! That's for sure. What a great deconstruction of Neo-advaita non-sense! 

[billko1977]

i think this is an excerpt from a tony parsons retreat. ha ha

[cmonkey5]

There is also no one kicking you in the balls. There is no foot and no balls and yet you're bent over groaning.

[DavidAKZ]

@cmonkey5 these are relative truths. The absolute truth is there are no balls or pain. My guess is you need to view the relative truth with compassion too.

[realityparticles]

He sounds like Tony Parsons.

[Jimsterr]

There is no teaching, including Advaida, which is broad enough to capture this everything. I'd much rather hang out with the girl bear, lol. The boy bear just seems too bent on being separate. I guess that's the trap.

[AExodus7]

@Jimsterr Who is separate? The girl bear is the boy bear. The difference is only a thoughtful overlay on unchanging reality.

[bdegress]

lol. are those supposed to be bears?

[ChristianAdvaita]

This is super! Many thanks!